Friday Lore Post: Glassheart Castern

South of the forest that dominates most of eastern Menechit, Glassheart Castern is a city that grew up around a series of temples and supported itself through forestry. Though it hasn’t been a major city politically for centuries, Glassheart Castern currently occupies an important economic position as the major supplier of lumber for most of Kyaine. 

Glassheart Castern is constructed around the lowest point in the region, a seasonal rainwater pond that used to provide drinking water for the city but no longer does as the forces purifying the water no longer exist. The roads and buildings are constructed in a spiral that leads from the highest point exterior to the city to the very lowest point in the centre of the city, which in the summer is generally dry. In the spring and fall the pond is filled with rainwater, which freezes in the winter, though not always enough to walk on. Ancient permanent walkways are well-maintained, allowing people to traverse the pond for most of the year. 

The town that is now called Glassheart Castern was originally built by servants of a clan of reclusive gods who had a vested interest in remaining reclusive. Clan Takan built the underground temples to avoid appearing in public often. They purified the water that flowed into them and sent it back up through the town’s aqueducts, which ran uphill in a magically powered flow that kept the whole settlement clean.

The town was called Uphill and was populated by people who venerated the gods of Clan Takan and lived under their protection. Clan Takan largely didn’t participate in the war except for one wayward son, but that didn’t protect Uphill from attack. The Spider Company attacked and killed the gods in the temples and converted the temples into a base that could be used as an outpost in their war. 

Uphill was renamed Glassheart Castern after a major battle happened there between the two sides of the split Spider Company, in which the citizens sided with the newly founded angels. This was the first time in history that humans got involved in the angel/demon war. The city is one of the major sites in Catechism history for this reason. 

After the war, the city floundered for a good several decades. Being a place of pilgrimage bolstered the economy for a short time, but the city needed something else to stay afloat now that the gods were gone. Without the magically purified water, they had to rely on several small tributary rivers nearby, which is still the case today, though Glassheart Castern has also pioneered water filtering to make their pondwater safe to drink. 

The forestry saved the city and in fact, Glassheart Castern became the capital of Hechan because of this economic prominence until Hechan was eventually conquered by Kyaine, after which the city remained economically important but lost its political relevance, a status it still generally holds today. 

Today, Glassheart Castern is ruled by Kyaine’s House Grournight, a noble family with a lineage dating back to the old royalty of Hechan. The historical veracity of this is in doubt, but it is their claim, in any case. It remains economically important for as long as lumber is an important resource, and because few living in the city now know about the gods’ old home under the foundations, the city’s unique construction and strange aqueducts are considered a historical mystery to someday be solved. 

From “The Definitive Atlas of the World, Vol. 1: Lands and Locations,” by Pascal Tiberius Naoton Quimbell Haeverine anNatalie, published in White Cape in DN 1997.